Posted on 05/02/2005 8:31:54 AM PDT by qam1
The part about fewer teens driving is soooo true.
My 17 year old is the only one of his friends that drives.
The kids keep their restricted licenses, but don't convert to a full driver's license because that immediately ups your insurance payment about $250 per month.
Well, it is either that or they shack up early.
Probably good to pay down their debts.
College education is a waste on an 18 year old. Too much partying. Let'em work in the real world a while (as I did as an enlisted man for 4 years) to learn what life is really like and to gain some focus, then go to back to school when you are able to understand the serious business that college is. My 2 cents worth.
I think much of this could be empirically quantified. That is, check ratios of wages/income of graduates against certain indicators, such as housing cost, transportation, food, etc. and hold the values in constant dollars and see if there really is an increase in economic pressure on today's twentysomethings.
On the other hand, I think there is a strong element of wanting instant and perfect gratification. As the article suggested, are twentysomething waiting to find that mythical, "perfect soul-mate"? Are twentysomethings unwilling to live in an apartment because they think they deserve a house right away?
In other words, absent hard economic data, perhaps we should assume that the expectations of these twentysomethings, pampered by their relatively affluent parents, may have unreasonable expectations, an indicator of which may be large personal credit card debt at a young age that contributes to their economic troubles.
When I got out of the USAF and was going to college, I did something crazy to afford my apartment....I got ROOMMATES!
Good for you! That's the way this is supposed to work - this business of growing up.
I got out of college when I was 22 and out of my mother's house three months later. THAT was a big day!
That's great, I had roommates too. But my point was, if these kids are sponging off the public I have a right to bitch about it, if it is a private family arrangement I don't really.
The funny thing is...I have a marketing degree but didn't actually need it for my job! My first job out of college needed a degree and I barely made 22 grand that year. I now make 3 times that and while having a degree certainly made my resume look better it wasn't a must.
I have three children with summer/fall birthdays and I sent them all to Kindergarten right away at age 4/5 (not holding them back until they are 6, the current fad) so that when they are 17, they can move out of the house!
I see no reason why they can't rent a cheap room in a basement somewhere, like I did.
The cost of living in California is higher. A LOT higher. And some careers don't pay off as well, or as soon, as young people are led to believe.
This drives me crazy. There are no excuses. If you make the right choices, you get where you want to be. I'm 26, put myself though college and graduated in 2001 with a degree in Journalism, but found a job that made decent money. I never went back to my parents. I am now married, and own a house that has almost doubled in value since we bought it, and have plenty in savings.
Now granted, the house may not have come along without meeting my husband in college, but still. I think I'd still be in a great situation if that didn't happen.
It's about the right choices. My mom raised my sister and I working 3 jobs, and I learned that I did not what that to happend to my kids some day. I wanted to be able to provide for my family the things that I was never offered.
It can be done.
Why is every generation worse than the generation before? Many young married couples in the early 1950's had to live with their parents before they could buy a house. During the immigration years in this country apartments housed up to 8 adults, married or not. When families had large farms early in this country, the parents would GIVE their children land to build their own homes and live near by.
Baby boomers aren't paying for college so the kids have alot of debt. Divorce if so high that these kids have no one helping them make decisions because their parents are too concerned with themselves. 20 year olds now have to pay auto insurance, health care, and high taxes on everything. When I moved out in the 70's, car insurance was an option, health care was cheap, renting was cheap, gas for my car was 70 cents, ciggs were 50 cents.
Also these kids are lied too. College is NOT for everyone. You still have to have a high IQ to graduate in a good major. Yet the boomers want their kids to go to college , take out loans and let the tax payer worry about them paying it back.
So, get used to adultescents - also known as the "kidults," "thresholders," and "boomerang babies." Sociologists say we will be seeing more in years to come.
I am mentoring some guys just out of prison. They remind me of Peter Pan.......just don't want to grow up.
This is not a radically new social trend; it's simply a return to the way things used to be in this and many other countries. Think of it as the "family manor" trend. Baby-boomers grew up sharing a small bedroom with one sibling and a bathroom with two or three more. Just watch a rerun of "The Brady Bunch". Nowadays, kids have their own bedrooms and, more and more often, each bedroom has a bathroom. The "bunkhouse" mentality was replaced by the "suite" approach. When baby-boomers returned from college, there wasn't much insentive for them to move into their parents' cramped house. Today, a 23 year old college grad with a good relationship with his or her parents has the choice of living on the cheap in some apartment or living in his old "suite" in his parents' manor house with all the fixings (pool, big kitchen, cable/satellite, etc.).
It cuts both ways, how many parents move in with their kids when they reach retirement age? My mother-in-law lives with us, and I wouldn't have it any other way. She helps with raising our kids, and it's certainly better than paying to put them into a nursing home, as well as the cost of hiring a nanny. I think this is another trend that is also on the increase.
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